Message on World Stroke Day, Oct. 29: Stroke is preventable, treatable and beatable

(DES MOINES, October 25, 2012) ? On World Stroke Day, Oct. 29, the American Stroke Association, a division of the American Heart Association, is urging people globally to reduce the threat of stroke in their lives and in the lives of loved ones.

Stroke is the second-leading cause of death in the world behind heart disease and a leading cause of severe, long-term disability. In the United States, someone suffers a stroke every 40 seconds, and someone dies of a stroke every three to four minutes.

Knowing the warning signs can help people get to a hospital quickly to be assessed for a clot-busting drug, which may reduce disability or death from stroke.  An easy way to recognize the sudden signs of stroke is to remember F.A.S.T:

·       F - Face Drooping - Does one side of the face droop or is it numb? Ask the person to smile.

·       A - Arm Weakness - Is one arm weak or numb? Ask the person to raise both arms. Does one arm drift downward?

·       S - Speech Difficulty - Is speech slurred? Is the person unable to speak or hard to understand? Ask the person to repeat a simple sentence like: "The sky is blue." Is the sentence repeated correctly?

·       T - Time to call 9-1-1 - If the person shows any of these symptoms, even if the symptoms go away, call 9-1-1 and get the person to the hospital immediately.

Stroke affects 795,000 Americans annually. Yet in a November 2011survey commissioned by the American Stroke Association, only 63 percent of adults could name one or more stroke warnings signs. Immediately after exposure to the F.A.S.T. acronym, 87 percent of adults could recall at least one correct sign.

To learn more about stroke, the warning signs and to participate in the World Stroke Day Instagram campaign, visit strokeassociation.org/worldstrokeday.

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American Heart Association/American Stroke Association

God Meets Science

In the Presidential Election, the Two Don't Get Along. But Should They?

By: Daniel Friedmann

Do you believe that evolution should be taught in public schools, and that it should be presented as the only explanation for how the species arose?  Based on statements made in the past few years by President Obama and Republican nominee Mitt Romney, it appears they both would answer "yes."

However, Romney's fellow Republicans don't all agree. For example, Republican Congressman Paul Broun from Georgia recently announced that evolution, embryology, and the Big Bang theory are "lies straight from the pit of hell."

Furthermore, Romney may have recently changed his mind since in the first presidential debate he stated, "We're all children of the same God" -- in stark contradiction to evolutionists' conclusion!

Meanwhile, only 15 percent of the US population believes in naturalistic evolution as the explanation for our origins!

And while the Catholic Church has stopped arguing against scientific findings such as the age of the universe or when life first appeared, it holds that whatever happened was guided in some way by God; in agreement with nearly half of Americans.

For the past couple hundred years, the creation-evolution conflict has been a recurring point of contention in the United States, from the presidential election to what should be taught in schools. American science legend Carl Sagan tried to settle this conflict by calling both camps "non-overlapping magisterial" - in other words, science and religion each preside as the source of wisdom over separate domains.

However, most of us feel that Sagan's explanation is not right. In fact, it turns out that a significant portion of Americans believe science and religion can coexist when it comes to explaining our origins.

The problem between science and religion did not originate over the question of HOW we came to be ? creation vs. evolution ? but over the question of WHEN the Earth came to be.  The creation-evolution conflict was sparked when early geologists began to find evidence that the Earth was older than the Bible seemed to indicate.

Today science tells us that the universe is 13.7 billion years old and the earth 4.5 billion years old; seemingly in contradiction to the biblical creation timeline of six days, less than 6,000 years ago.

A couple years ago I found the blueprint for my house, a piece of rolled up paper with lots of lines that bore little resemblance to my beautiful three-dimensional home. I could not make heads or tails of the blueprint. That is, until I saw the scale: 1 inch equals 8 feet. Now I could compare the blueprint and the house - everything matched, at least as to what it was and how big it was.

Now, the Bible claims to be the blueprint for the universe; but has anyone bothered to look for the scale of this blueprint? I mean, the story is narrated in creation days (analogous to the role of inches on the house blueprint), but what are these creation days in the physical structure, the universe?

It turns out that the Scriptures contain the scale ? it has been found: 1 creation day is 1,000 X 365 X 7,000 or 2.5 billion years. That's right, the scale is really simple, it's been there all along,  and when you apply it to events in Genesis, it converts 19 events to the time we measure in science.

What do we get after converting these events? Agreement within measurement error; very old Scriptures contain the times for key events relating to the development of the universe and the appearance of life on Earth that science has only recently uncovered.

So if both science and the Bible agree on what happened and when it happened, why keep arguing?

Because there is still the HOW it happened. But having found agreement on the "when" and the "what," sheds new light on the issue. It is time to check out the scale, reread the biblical blueprint and stop the 200-year-old argument in politics, education....

Daniel Friedmann is the author of The Genesis One Code, and CEO of an aerospace company. He has a master's in engineering physics and 30 years' experience in the space industry, and has published more than 20 peer-reviewed scientific papers. He is also a long-time student of cosmology and religion.

ST. LOUIS (October 25, 2012) - When it comes to soybean cyst nematode (SCN), which costs U.S. soybean farmers $1 billion annually in crop losses, farmers can never have enough potential solutions. Twice recently, research funded by the United Soybean Board (USB) and soy checkoff has yielded potential breakthroughs in fighting off this devastating disease.

In a paper titled "A Soybean Cyst Nematode Resistance Gene Points to a New Mechanism of Plant Resistance to Pathogens," scientists reveal that they identified and validated the gene at the Rhg4 locus, a major driver in a soybean plant's resistance to SCN.

"The checkoff has a number of projects that aim to identify the genes in a soybean plant that can effectively control SCN," says USB Production program Chair Jim Schriver, a soybean farmer from Bluffton, Ind. "Even though there are different types of SCN, if we could take advantage of those genes that control resistance, it would be effective for all types of SCN."

The study, published recently in the online journal Nature, is the first to identify the gene and its mechanism for creating resistance, according to the article's lead authors, Khalid Meksem, Ph.D., of Southern Illinois University Carbondale (SIUC) and Melissa Goellner Mitchum, Ph.D., of the University of Missouri at Columbia.

"Funding and support from USB and the soy checkoff have been crucial to this new discovery of disease resistance, which will be used to develop products that will benefit U.S. soybean farmers," says Meksem, associate professor of plant, soil science and agricultural systems at SIUC. "This discovery comes at a time when farmers need new solutions, as the nematodes adapt and find ways through the soybeans' defenses."

The team hopes their research will lead to a better understanding of how the resistant genes work and ultimately lead to improved crop yield.

A separate checkoff-funded project recently found that soybean plants with multiple copies of a multi-gene block known as Rhg1 also show better resistance to SCN. Both projects allow researchers to focus on these gene structures - Rhg1 and Rhg4 - to help them develop SCN-resistant U.S. soybean varieties.

The 69 farmer-directors of USB oversee the investments of the soy checkoff to maximize profit opportunities for all U.S. soybean farmers. These volunteers invest and leverage checkoff funds to increase the value of U.S. soy meal and oil, to ensure U.S. soybean farmers and their customers have the freedom and infrastructure to operate, and to meet the needs of U.S. soy's customers. As stipulated in the federal Soybean Promotion, Research and Consumer Information Act, the USDA Agricultural Marketing Service has oversight responsibilities for USB and the soy checkoff.

For more information on the United Soybean Board, visit www.unitedsoybean.org
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